According to a new market report published by Transparency Market Research “Big Data Market – Global Scenario, Trends, Industry Analysis, Size, Share and Forecast, 2012 – 2018″ the global big data market was worth USD 6.3 billion in 2012 and is expected to reach USD 48.3 billion by 2018, at a CAGR of 40.5% from 2012 to 2018. North America is expected to maintain its lead position in terms of revenues till 2018, with about 54.5% share of the global big data market revenue, followed by Europe.

Generation of huge amounts of data, called big data, across different sectors such as banking, healthcare, retail and education, among others, is creating the need for an efficient tool to manage this data. Conventional database management tools such as Relational Database Management System (RDBMS) do not have the capability to manage surging volumes of unstructured data. This has led to the development of various tools and technologies to manage big data.

The basic components of big data include software and services, hardware, and storage. Software and services segment held the largest share, accounting for more than 50% of the total big data market in 2012. The storage segment is expected to be the fastest growing segment at a CAGR of 45.3% from 2012 to 2018. This can be attributed to the exponential increase in the amount of data across different sectors. The financial services sector is one of the major contributors to the big data market, and held nearly 20% of the market in 2012.

Big data tools are emerging to be of great help to banks and financial institutes in utilizing the depth of data collected. The media and entertainment sector, though with a small market share contribution currently; is expected grow at a CAGR of 41.4% from 2012 to 2018. This growth will primarily be due to the humungous amount of data generated through games, images, videos and so on. Healthcare is another large and important segment of the world economy that has been facing tremendous productivity challenges in the form of drug failure, drug approval and regulatory barriers. Big data helps the healthcare market players in managing their data efficiently, making important corporate decisions and formulating business growth strategies.

The big data market is primarily driven by factors such as exponential growth in different forms of data collected and cost benefits derived from the use of big data tools. However, shortage of skilled personnel and efficient use of big data tools is limiting the growth of this market.

North America accounted for more than 50% of the overall big data market revenues in 2012. However, the Asia-Pacific region will be the fastest growing market and will grow at a CAGR of 42.6% from 2012 to 2018. Flourishing outsourcing industry, distributed manufacturing hubs and lenient regulations on data sharing are the several factors creating significant opportunities in the Asia-Pacific region for the big data market.

The humungous amount of data generated across various sectors is termed as big data. The exponential growth in the quantum of big data is leading to the development of advanced technology and tools that can manage and analyze this data. Hadoop technology is used by Yahoo, Facebook, LinkedIn and eBay among others to manage and analyze the big data. This study will provide complete insights of the Big Data market and explain about the current trends and factors responsible for driving market growth. The analysis will prove helpful for emerging players to know about the growth strategies implemented by existing players and help existing players in strategic planning. The report includes segmentation of the big data market by components, by applications and by geography.

The different components included are software and services, hardware and storage. Software and services segment dominates the components market whereas storage segment will be the fastest growing segment for the next 5 years owing to the perpetual growth in the data generated. We have covered eight applications namely financial services, manufacturing, healthcare, telecommunication, government, retail and media & entertainment and others in the application segment. Financial Services, healthcare and the government sector are the top three contributors of the big data market and together held more than 55% of the big data market in 2012. Media and Entertainment and the healthcare sectors will grow at high CAGR of nearly 42% from 2012 to 2018. The growth in data in the form of video, images, and games is driving the media and entertainment segment.